Thursday, May 31, 2007

Ben Stewart: An Apology

Sometimes when you write instanteanous responses to things you go over the top - it doesn't matter whether it's on an email or a blog. It happens. I did this on Tuesday in my Greenpeace post HERE. While I don't retract the thrust of the post (that Greenpeace are acting outrageously in seeking to close down the climate change debate) I did indeed use inappropriate and intemperate language regarding Ben Stewart and I'd like to apologise to him for that. He hasn't asked for an apology, but on reflection he deserves one.

59 comments:

A dignified post - well done. However, if you are looking to use your renowned acidity anywhere today, please listen to the nauseous and hypocritical speech Blair is making on foreign policy intervention in Africa and fisk that! The man who has shattered Iraq and won't do anything in Zimbabwe still manages to claim the moral high ground in all that he does. Pass the sick bag...

Iain, thank you for that. Although we disagree on your contention that Greenpeace is shutting down debate, our discussions and emails over the past few days have affirmed my belief that blogs are an invaluable forum for public discourse. The thread after your initial post was an excellent read - a really lively and largely articulate discussion.

What a load of codswallop you got it right the first time . Your language was not extreme unless you are somebodies menopausal maiden aunt. Ecofascist has a hyperbolical humour to it but also shines light into the totalitarian attitudes of the Green worshippers and rightly so .This Ben Stewart curse should be ashamed of his behaviour and I hope the craven propagandist has learnt an over due lesson. If they won`t play then they forfeit the game and their reputation .An apology is owed to you not visa versa

So I demand an unequivocal apology for this apology ,and immediate financial compensation foe the hurt and distress you have now cause to those who defended you in the first place.

Chamberlain got it right just once, by improving on Jackie Fisher: "Never complain, never explain, never apologise".

While I deplore the main track of your politics, you are at least partly to be excused in taking offence at Greenery.

Yesterday was an egregious example. The BBC was promoting a peculiarly specious argument culled from the Stansted nimbies: airport expansion should be checked because it only encourages people to travel, to the disadvantage of British trade. All those lower orders daring to wing orf to Spain, when they should be happy with a week at Cleethorpes.

I recall that Wordsworth made the point as long ago as 1844, objecting to the arrival of railways in Cumbria:

And is no nook of English ground secureFrom rash assault? Schemes of retirement sownIn youth, and ‘mid the busy world kept pureAs when their earliest flowers of hope were blown,Must perish; - how can they this blight endure?And must he too his old delights disownWho scorns a false utilitarian lure‘Mid his paternal fields at random thrown?

Rarely does one see the classist prejudice of our rurals so obvious. But that's Toryism for you.

On the issue of debating Mr Lawson, I will make a further, brief effort to explain my position, again using the analogy of the South African Health Minister (on the contention that HIV doesn't cause AIDS). If you had debated this chap for ten or fifteen years, as all the while the science became more certain, and if the media enjoyed the theatre of that confrontational debate more than covering the nuts and bolts of AIDS prevention policy, so as a result people were left with the impression that the scientific community was deeply split on the link between HIV and AIDS, when in reality it was not, then you would begin to question whether or not you should continue to debate the Minister. But you would continue, as I have for many years with climate sceptics, until eventually you decided that at some point a line should be drawn. Not a line which you ask everyone to draw, but one which you yourself are comfortable with. That line, for me, came earlier this year with the publication of IPCC4. When the (very conservative) body of scientists said they are 95% certain that anthropogenic climate change is a reality, that, in my opinion, was the moment to move on from debating the science and get talking about the policy response. And boy are there some big arguments for us all to have about that.

Of course even if you disagreed with (hypothetically) the Terrence Higgins Trust in the their decision to not debate the Minister, would you immediately brand them crypto-fascists? Ask yourself that, would you? Of course not...

You say that debating is the way to expose the weakness of an argument. Yep. Absolutely. That's why I suggested a scientist to you (in my second email) to debate Dominic in my place. The reason I am not comfortable debating Lawson ON THE SCIENCE is in part for the reason I've already said - that two activists talking about the science almost always ends up as a shouting match in which statistics are thrown at each other like confetti - statistics that no-one watching can identify as true or false. It is an extremely poor way to debate the subject and results in the very false impression in the mind of the viewer that "it's all very complicated, there are a million reports about, and I just don’t know who to believe." For that reason I suggested you go for a scientist. Not that you told your readers that.

Of course, you never told me you were planning to have scientists on. That would have resulted in a different response, I would have said, "Fine, they can do the science, Dominic and I can talk about wider issues. Such as why the Tories are going green, whether the environment movement is a new religion (no, by the way) etc etc." But you never told me you were inviting scientists on, you kept that gem for the 100,000 readers of your blog...

The ridiculous Gary Elsby reappears like the turd that won't flush. I still have my suspicions that this guy is a Borat style piss take of the left.

The Boyne? A battle 250 years before Iain's birth. The fool can't even spell Hague(or was it a failed attempt at the Field Marshal?) or remarkably grammar schools. Maybe if Gary had gone to a Grammar School then they would have taught him how to spell it(and a few other things). Surely David Willetts should be informed...

Iain well done- I thought your post was over the top and am really glad to see you think so too. We all make mistakes- I'm sure I do- and the key thing is to apologise when we get it wrong- so well done!

No you didn't. It was proportionate, reasonable and justified. You should be apologisng for having censored your original remarks. Don't give these creatures any quarter: they are enemies of the people and of the State.

Mr Stewart: IPCC4 claims that climate change is '90% likely' to be the result of human activity, not, as you claim, 95%. There are problems with the way that the IPCC came up with the 90% number, but even so, this is an extremely weak acceptable level of confidence in a hypothesis test. The debate goes on, with or without Greenpeace.

The debate over anthropogenic climate change continues, not least because the IPCC4 contains no science: it is a fourth "summary for policy-makers" which is entirely different.

The IPCC have not yet released the data on which they have based these reports. And if the science is unambiguous, then might one ask why they have published four summaries?

Because the summaries are circulated to said "policymakers" who then give feedback on the paper. These policymakers are not, in the main, scientists but politicians.

The IPCC are effectively asking politicians to tell them what the "policymakers" would like the final data to show.

This isn't exactly standard practice when publishing scientific papers although, as far as climate change scientists are concerned, the hiding and non-duplication of data attached to papers seems to be increasing.

So, we need to ask ourselves: what have these scientists got to hide? Why will they not publish their data? Why will they not even produce methods for replication?

There has only ever been one reason for a Political group declaring a “state of emergency” which is justifying grabbing greater power for themselves. The scientific community is not much split because shouting panic is what gets their money. It is also encouraged by the UN who seek to spread their global influence by the exaggeration of a problem requiring a “global Government”. It is , as well , not a balanced community . Can you imagine the results were its members polled on abortion , on the “value of science” we can expect consistent bias . This is the sleight of hand from which the Green zealots wish to “ Move swiftly on”.

This illusion is maintained by boxing off the science which is the propaganda point he is cynically trying to obtain. . Its no good to say that if some “scientists” have their play we will sit outside the cathedral until they come out. This will allow the Green cult to say look at the balance of scientific opinion as if no-one else was allowed to question the integrity and use of such a constituency. The value or otherwise or expert opinion and its history in the court is a good example for us to look at here and it this sort of area that Ben is frightened of. Additionally he wants to give the impression that science is not politically driven which it is.

. The science involved is to do with computer modelling and projections and interpretation and not to be compared with directly and daily empirically tested medical knowledge. Can you imagine with their history of wildly incorrect predictions how you would feel going into surgery if these were really comparable? Again they do not want this understood. .Furthermore the suggestion that opposition to this agenda is no more to be taken seriously than religious opposition to Western Science is wrong insulting and transparently stupid . This is the second time Ben has made this infuriating error , the first being the reference to Richard Dawkins and the creationists. You might just as well say those against me are mad. I think not His reference to the Terence Higgins Trust is fallacious for the same reason and at this point he is actually saying outright what is the point of debating when I know . I am right ..

Anthropocentric climate change is in some sense a reality but look at the sinister way this apologists puts his case. Of course the basic physics are not in doubt, the question arise over its significance time scale and usefulness in creating predictive models. In short whether its a problem or just a delightful excuse for more bullying. It becomes pretty clear why Ben did not want to answer any questions . We do not spend resources on wind shutters when a butterfly flaps its wings for all that we all agree there is a effect.

He says . It is an extremely poor way to debate the subject and results in the very false impression in the mind of the viewer that "it's all very complicated,

This “Science “ that is now collapsing or at least being recast and the rock upon which all the rest of the Green Party’s collectivist illiberal and totalitarian agenda rests. This is a subject of considerable embarrassment to eco fascists as whatever may now be imputed form the state of play. It is easy to show that the Green agenda is not driven by science but takes science to flesh out existing people hating prejudice. It will latch onto anything that turn up .They claim that people are too stupid to discriminate oh really !Well we have better abandon trial by jury and parliament then had we not which would probably suit you as well.

, I would have said, "Fine, they can do the science, Dominic and I can talk about wider issues.

. Like the use of the environment to justify taxes , super national dictatorship and micro controlling legislation for a left over band of levellers who actually would like us to back to the middle ages ( which were warm so it might be nice). It is just one piece of nonsense after another. The conclusions about where we are what drives discussion of what we must do is this not obvious you cannot separate the two and elsewhere they do not By the weakness of his comparisons he entirely undermines the credibility of his answer and by his failure to respond he must invite the inference that he cannot .I have no objection the Conservatives advocating caution allied to enlightened self interest but the reason Ben wants to get into this is so he can take the crushing importance of his single issue as read much else follows and this is why he adopts his indefensible position.

Ben Stewart's decision that Greenpeace should not debate warming because of the new IPCC report (actually considerably less alarmist than the previous one) seems to have coincided closly with the March 14th debate on warming:

"In this debate, the proposition was: "Global Warming Is Not a Crisis." In a vote before the debate, about 30 percent of the audience agreed with the motion, while 57 percent were against and 13 percent undecided. The debate seemed to affect a number of people: Afterward, about 46 percent agreed with the motion, roughly 42 percent were opposed and about 12 percent were undecided." The subsequent vote of the radio audience was even more decisive.

You spent ten or fifteen years saying he was wrong. That's not a debate. Nor is shouting hysterically on, for example, the rare occasions al-beeb confronts one of your co-religionists with a non-believer.

"people were left with the impression that the scientific community was deeply split on the link between HIV and AIDS"

No they were not. They were left with the impression that their was a scientific consensus about it even though the actual evidence seemed to wilt under examination. The Sunday Times seemed to stop campaigning about it only because no-one was really interested. When a tv programme examined the issue the scientific 'consensus' retreated to assertion and tautologies.

"eventually you decided that at some point a line should be drawn"

Gracious of you to save humanity from itself. Alternatively, perhaps you could develop a new hobby that doesn't involve plunging the world into global poverty and repression.

"the (very conservative) body of scientists said they are 95% certain that anthropogenic climate change is a reality"

The (very anti-West) body of unelected politicians at the UN said they are 95% certain that they should have more power at the expense of western governments, economies and peoples.

"get talking about the policy response. And boy are there some big arguments for us all to have about that."

Yeah right. Let's get on with deciding the response to the things you demand be accepted. Assuming the truth of your 'scientific' premises by implementing policy conclusions must be a good way to get tax-money into the hands of special interest groups.

"you immediately brand them crypto-fascists?"

I might if they were pushing an agenda designed to impoverish and imprison whole populations with no-one being allowed to say anything about it.

"results in the very false impression in the mind of the viewer that "it's all very complicated, there are a million reports about, and I just don’t know who to believe."

Condescending, patronising, and self-regarding. Exactly what is your IQ, genius?

"Of course, you never told me you were planning to have scientists on."

So, you didn't bother about the facts. You just assumed you knew best. Seems to be a pattern.

"whether the environment movement is a new religion (no, by the way)"

Yes, by the way.

"you never told me you were inviting scientists on, you kept that gem for the 100,000 readers of your blog..."

Excluding al-beeb, exactly how many people show interest in your gems?

The problem is that Science has a big problem with the use of the word "is". It has only a very specific and exact use, meaning equal and identical.

The question of global warming revolves around whether the evidence proves that the large increase in anthropogenic CO2 emissions are the cause of the observed phenomenon of global warming or not. Overwelmingly the science seems to suggest that it is. The fact that there is a little wiggle room in the specific word "seem" does not alter the fact that the probability of CO2 emmisions being directly related to global warming is very high indeed. Indeed there is no peer reviewed scientific evidence that contradicts the thesis at all, although there is scientific debate about the intepretation of the data. Nevertheless, as far as Science is concerned anthropogenic global warming is a reality. Unfortunately, as far as political commentators are concerned, the split is more like 50-50.

One might point out that Greenpeace are as guilty as anybody else as regards manipulation of data. Lomborg is emphatically not a scientist. He's an economist/statistician with an opinion. An opinion that has been criticised, not because of its content, but because of its non-adherence to scientific method.

As D-K has said above the whole IPCC process is manifestly fraudulent as science, as is most climate change propaganda. Data is being fitted to a pre-defined conclusion. Normal scientific method demands that any hypothesis that has data discrepancies is automatically false and must be re-stated and re-tested against the data. There is a very small degree of allowed uncertainty, and the current state of data versus hypotheses is clearly one of huge uncertainty, so anyone such as Greenpeace claiming otherwise is simply a liar with, presumably some other agenda than the pursuit of knowledge.

One point I haven't seen put is that we are dealing with chaotic systems. At the micro end of the weather system scale, the level of chaos in the systems precludes any accuracy in forecasting beyond 3-4 days. Which begs two questions. Firstly, what is the limit of prediction at the macro end ie climate as opposed to weather? Secondly, given that these are chaotic systems, how does anyone know what are the outcomes of changes in anthropogenic inputs?

Iain, you are undoubtedly a gentleman, but your apology to this lout and his boorish organisation is misplaced.

CICERO - No , not exactly , previous warm periods seem to have caused increased CO2 is the atmosphere , ie its the other way round. They rely now on an "Amplification " theory.In any case as I have said the existence of causal relationship does not make it significant.That is excatly the sort of proportionality that Green peace want removed from public view

It occurrs to me that the Green Party`s attitude to debating the science actually coincides with the subject becoming serious politics . In other words the first time anyone felt the need to question them.That is the real reason for "A line being drawn".

seeing as you're a chum of those jolly reasonable greenpeace chaps now Iain, I wonder if you can get them to put back that mock-up photo of a jet airliner diving headlong into a nuclear power station they had on their website a little while ago. My daughter would like it for a school project she's doing on the environment. The title she's been given by her teacher is 'oh no, we're all going to die horribly! don't panic! Just do exactly what we tell you'

Ben,If we could affect global warming the govt would be taking real and practical measures to reduce energy use, instead they're waving through airports expansion projects. In reality they just use climate change as an excuse to increase taxes. John Humphries on R4 reported this morning that a disused school building in Scotland has lights on all night because the local authorities think they owe a duty of care to anyone breaking in during the night who might injure themselves if the building were in darkness.

Has the govt done anything to make cycling easier or safer? -no they charge you VAT on bicycles. Why do they charge VAT on solar panels? - the reaon is because it would reduce your power bill on which they collect VAT?

The govt are not interested in any anti pollution measures which don't raise taxes.

Well done Iain, though I still cannot see how picking and choosing media engagements according to who the other panellists may be is trying to close down any debate. Will post on this later. Bet you can't wait. Sad to have missed the unexpurgated version ...

And Newmania are we now to understand that it is the Green Party that have refused to shoot the breeze on 18DS and not Greenpeace?

I do urge everyone to read Devil's Kitchen's post [1.53. AM]. There is something distinctly unscientific about IPCC4, the document which prompted our Ben to draw a line under the debate. (Now where have I heard that phrase before?)

But Iain, has Ben ever watched one of your programs? He says "two activists talking about the science almost always ends up as a shouting match." I agree that on the Today programme, for example, many discussions are ruthlessly curtailed and generate more heat than light. Ben may not appreciate that 18DS, by contrast, is the home of unhurried, thoughtful debate.

Mr Stewart states that the environmental movement is not a religion (though there are extremely close parallels). He might be right.

It strikes me that there is a further parallel, however, between his unwillingness to engage his opponents and the unwillingness of the medieval Papacy to debate those it regarded as heretics. Luckily, the crusade against those of us who disagree with Mr Stewart's view of things is still very much in its infancy.

He sounds as though he is rather surprised that people other than Greenpeace supporters can read and write. The thing is, we can, and we can reason and debate too, and we don't need him adopting this "nanny knows best" attitude. After all, we've got the Government for that!

Mr Stewart: IPCC4 claims that climate change is '90% likely' to be the result of human activity, not, as you claim, 95%. There are problems with the way that the IPCC came up with the 90% number, but even so, this is an extremely weak acceptable level of confidence in a hypothesis test. The debate goes on, with or without Greenpeace.

I thought the figure was 90% as well, though I haven't been able to find a link to support that.

What piqued my interest was an article about scientific worthiness vis à vis 90% and 95%, one being worthless, the other actually meaning something.

Typical I can't find that article either but it makes one wonder about Ben.

Jafo, I said it was a *largely* articulate debate because some of the posts - including some for me and some against me - were borderline batshit crazy. I think I was accused of being a murderer at one point.

It seems you can't put a foot forward without getting hit in the comments section of blogs. I was just saying the discussion was great. I recognise that even those people who lambasted me made great points. That's all I wanted to say. Really.

You were very kind to apologise to Greenpeace, Iain, however I do not believe they were owed an apology - on the contrary, they should apologise for trying to shut down the debate. Ben Stewart's arrogant reply was shocking.

However, Greenpeace co-founder, Patrick Moore, might not be so shocked, since Moore says he has been smeared as an "Eco-Judas" and traitor by environmentalists.

Moore left Greenpeace in 1986 because, he says, the group became too radical and he could "no longer agree with the policies that were being espoused."

"The Left figures it owns the environmental movement and that has corrupted the movement greatly," Moore said. "The [left-wing] influence has brought great dysfunction into the environmental movement. [It's turned it into] an elitist movement."

The final straw, according to Moore, came when he failed to persuade Greenpeace to abandon its campaign to ban chlorine worldwide.

"I pointed out that chlorine was the main element used in our medicine and adding it to drinking water was the biggest advance in public health in human history," Moore said. "[My argument] just fell on deaf ears. [Greenpeace] didn't care about any of that because a global chlorine ban was a good campaign [for them]."

You, sir, are nothing better than a liar. You are entirely dishonest in your argument here.

Earlier, to Iain, you asserted that the debate over whether human activity causes damaging climate change to the debate about whether smoking causes fatal cancer; you now compare it to the debate about whether HIV causes AIDS.

Neither analogy stands up to inspection. In both cases you are comparing the global warming debate with a genuine concensus based on sound science with the aim of making people assume there is a similar concensus on climate change based on sound science, and with the further aim of ingraining the assumption that doubting your case is unacceptible. This is simply not true, so your aim is dishonest. Your technique is pure propoganda.

Finally please don't quote the IPCC. They have actually stated that changes were made to their conclusions "...at the request of governemnts, NGOs and individual scientists". In other words the reports are simply the opinions governments, NGOs and a few individual scientists want to spread.

They were also largely written by non-specialists including professional environmentalists, with very poor academic records. I know people who had more work published in their undergraduate degrees than some of the authors have (some have no papers in peer-review journals) and people who had more papers published during their PhDs than some of the lead authors! The UN has refused open access to the reviews of the reports (only in hard copy in a single library), and many of the authors use data which are not available for others to review, a standard not acceptible to a peer-review journal. You must know this, it is your job to know. Quoting the IPCC, knowing how flawed its work is, is also dishonest.

If your case is so strong, why the dishonesty? The only reasonable conclusion is that even you know how weak your case is.

"The [left-wing] influence has brought great dysfunction into the environmental movement"

Rememeber Brent Spar? The most environmentally-sound method of disposal was clearly to tow it to deep ocean and sink it. The best way to attack a large oil company (good target for the left-wing environmentalist, ticks all the wrong boxes!) is to make a huge fuss.

This is in response to Newmania's ascertains yesterday that it is in Climatologist's financial interests to come up with evidence that supports the claim that Global Warming is man made. This may interest you.